Intranet Design and Governance
Over the last 3 months, one of the projects we’ve been working on at PebbleRoad is the revamp and redesign of a client organization’s intranet.
The organization has over 700 staff, most of them at the headquarters, but a significant number of them in their other locations spread all over Singapore.
The role of PebbleRoad was to conduct research, then redesign the structure and the layout (wireframes) for the new intranet based on the research. Another company would then use our design to do the actual implementation of the intranet.
We’re almost finished with our part. Although I can’t divulge too many details at this point, it’s been a fun and fulfilling ride so far.
As part of the research, we had to conduct many interviews with different staff, to understand their work habits, their informational needs, and so on. As of now, we’ve interviewed close to 10% of all staff.
Personally, those interviews weren’t just to find out what problems needed to be solved or even to understand the users – what was more important was that those interviews gave me an opportunity to have personal contact with those who will be using the intranet that I’m redesigning, to actually care about them. I’m not redesigning the intranet for some faceless silhouetted entity called the user; I’m doing it to help make the lives of these nice people a better.
Which makes the work alot more meaningful. It makes me want to do a better job.
But creating a wonderfully-designed intranet is only the start. What is equally important is how the intranet is cultivated, so that the benefits of the intranet can be maintained or increased, in symbiosis with the organization itself.
To help with that, we produced an intranet governance guide:
This guide describes a set of processes that need to be in place and a set of actions that need to be taken to sustain and grow the intranet. Without these guides and checks, we risk diluting the very efficiencies and productivity gains that the intranet is designed to provide.
My colleague and I had much discussion over this guide. I hope it’ll be useful for others who are maintaining intranets, or are planning to do so.
Which Comes First: Design or Research?
Since I’m into design (I’m a Design Consultant after all), I was pretty interested in PingMag’s interview with Ken Okuyama. While he’s mostly into product design (he’s behind the lovely design of the Enzo Ferrari), and I’m more into information and experience design, there’s always something I can learn from other design fields.
What stood out to me the most was how he typically starts his design process:
I put everything in my brain down on paper, stick all of it on the wall and judge objectively the best possible solution for the problem. Then I start the research after. Not before. Once you know, you cannot go back to “your ignorant yourself.” But the ignorant yourself is the best creative partner you have.
Where I work at PebbleRoad, we normally do it the other way round – keep an open mind and do the research first to find and understand the problem, before embarking on the design.
Humanized described our design philosophy very nicely in a recent post on interative:
Coming up with a solution is often the most straightforward part of the design process. That isn’t to say that creating the solution is easy, or doesn’t require a deep knowledge and honed skill set. It’s just to say that when you have a set of requirements and a well defined problem, you know where you stand and where you have to get to. It’s mostly straightforward. Much harder is the implicit problem of figuring out exactly what the problem is in the first place. If the problem is vague or ill-defined, the design solution will be too.
So far this has worked well for us, and it makes sense too, since we don’t really want to design something for the wrong problem.
But Okuyama has a valid point about “your ignorant yourself” being the “best creative partner”. Is that the key to the really groundbreaking and mind-blowing designs?
Something to think about, and something I’ll definitely try out in my next project. But that would never work if we forget his qualifying statement, which I deliberately left out from the quote above:
You also need the courage to adjust your original idea once it’s proven to fail.
Explaining RSS Feeds and Aggregators
Once upon a time…
I was teaching a course entitled “Discover News Aggregators & RSS” to a group of librarians last week.
Because most of them did not know anything about RSS, I wanted to make sure that every one of them left the course not just understanding what RSS was about, but remembering it for a very long time.
What better way than to tell a story.
But even before the class started, I got them curious: I crushed about 8 sheets of paper into individual paper balls, and placed them in front of random participants (there were about 25 participants).
“What are they for?” some of them had to ask.
“It’s for an activity later. Don’t throw them away; don’t eat them.”
So when the class finally started, after I gave a brief introduction, I scared them with the Wikipedia definition of RSS:
RSS (an acronym for Really Simple Syndication) is a family of web feed formats used to publish frequently updated digital content, such as blogs, news feeds or podcasts.
I also gave the Wikipedia definition of web feed:
A web feed is a data format used for serving users frequently updated content. Content distributors syndicate a web feed, thereby allowing users to subscribe to it. Making a collection of web feeds accessible in one spot is known as aggregation.
This was useful to help them appreciate my story better, since nobody could really grasp these definitions.
Before I started the story, I showed them the cast of characters:
Me (Coleman) – the user
You – the user’s favorite blog/website
Paper ball – new content
And I started my story (story words in italics):
Once upon a time, there was a young man named Coleman.
Every morning, he would turn on his computer, and access the internet.
Now he had around 25 favorite websites that he would visit every morning.
He would go the the first website, to see if there’s any new content. Any new content? (I went up to the first participant and asked her.) No?
Then he would go on to the next website. (I stepped up to the next participant.) Any new content? No?
Then to the next website. New content? (The 3rd participant had a paper ball.) YES! (I held up the ball.) Coleman would read the new content.
Then he would go on to the next website? Any new content? No?
So on and on he would go, visiting each of his favorite websites to check if there’s new content so that he could read it.
This, as you can see, is very inefficient, and wastes a lot of time, so Coleman was VERY SAD.
Then one day, the fairy godfather visited Coleman, and taught him about RSS feeds and RSS aggregators.
Armed with that knowledge, Coleman used his RSS aggregator (I produced and raised a dustbin)…
(And on the slide:)
Me (Coleman) – the user
You – the user’s favorite blog/website
Paper ball – new content
Dustbin – RSS aggregator
Coleman used his RSS aggregator to subscribe to the RSS feeds from each of his 25 favorite websites.
With that, every morning, when Coleman turned on his computer, he would open his RSS aggregator (raise the bin), and the new content from his 25 favorite websites would… (I motioned for those participants with the paper balls to throw them towards me, and I caught all of them with the bin)
and the new content from his favorite websites would automatically be collected by the RSS aggregator (raise the bin), so that he could read the new content from his favorite websites (I took out the balls one by one) without having to visit them one by one, ever again.
And so, Coleman lived happily ever after.
They loved it.
Update:
I forgot to thank those who gave me their views when I first sounded this idea, including Siva, Ivan, and Vanessa.
Feel free to use and modify this idea for your own purposes, as long as animals are not harmed in the process.
Why BlogOut Was So Noisy
BlogOut was too noisy.
Sure, noise can be a good thing at the right time, when ideas are flowing, but when there’s a panel discussion going on in front of the room, and most of the (interested) audience can’t hear what’s going on, you have a problem (astro described the situation in his post, Blogout or SpaceOut?).
So, why was it so noisy?
Crowd control, or the lack of it.
When the MC started the event proper, she didn’t manage to get everyone’s attention. There were still pockets of people standing and chatting at the rear area.
(photo from Kevin Lim)
It’s easy to expect the crowd to quieten down and pay attention eventually (I would have expected that myself), but it didn’t happen. On hindsight, the MC should have gotten the attention of everyone before starting.
Which would have helped for around 10 minutes at most, before those standing in the background resumed their conversations. We know that because the MC did ask pretty firmly for everyone to “be respectful” during the panel discussion. The success rate was around 80%, for around 5 minutes.
Mainly because there was a bigger factor at play:
The lack of chairs, or too many people standing in the background.
When you’re standing in the background in an event like that, it’s easy to feel like you’re not part of the seated group, meaning that you’re somehow excluded from the social norms and rules of that group.
I know because I’ve done that too many times myself.
Being excluded from the seated group, and part of the outsider group, there’s little inhibition from making a comment or two to the person standing beside you. And because you’re standing, it’s so easy to be facing your comment partner rather than the front of the room.
The perfect setup for a “backchannel” conversation.
There are a couple of other minor factors that I suspect have contributed in minor ways to the rather noisy atmosphere, like the arrangement of seats, the shape of the seats, and maybe even the presence of the food, drink, and waiting staff, but since they are minor, I shall refrain myself.
I hope this post gives some insight into the design of an event space, and the human dynamics within it. And hopefully, there will be enough seats next time 🙂
Kudos to the organizers. I still think they did well.
Update:
I completely missed out another major point – the poor sound system, although it was fine where I was (near the front). Thanks to Du Senyao Peter who pointed it out in the comments:
Though I think a major problem is with the sound system, which could not amplify the talking one’s voice very well so people at the back could not feel the presence of the one who is talking, be it emcee or the panelists
Forms Created by Nazi Developers
I was doing a bit of research on a site, and had to fill in a form. It was an application form for a university course.
As you can see above, I had filled in an address in the “Home Address” field.
Then I got this Javascript error message:
“Must end with a full-stop, have at least 1 but not more than 3 commas”? Amazing. Perhaps this is just a way to filter out applicants who have a poor comprehension of English.
Undaunted, I obediently added the missing “full-stop” to my fictitious address (even though I could have turned off Javascript instead), so it became
1, CROSS STREET.
(Note the “full-stop” I dutifully added. Also, it’s in CAPITAL LETTERS because the Javascript converted it so.)
Perfect.
Until I tried to submit the form, where I was greeted with another Javascript error:
I couldn’t stop laughing.
The real applicant probably wouldn’t be laughing though.
Discover Podcasting & Vodcasting
“How about YOU?”
So said one of my PowerPoint slides, as I threw out this challenge at the librarians attending my course on podcasting and vodcasting last tuesday.
By then, they had already learnt what podcasts (and vodcasts) were, how to find podcasts, how to subscribe to podcasts in iTunes, how to create a podcast using Audacity and ClickCaster, and how to upload a video clip to YouTube.
But learning about podcasts and vodcasts and YouTube videos, or even knowing how to create them, wasn’t quite enough – I wanted to encourage and inspire at least a few of them to actually go out and do something, to create something, whether on their own or with colleagues. Not an easy thing to accomplish in a 4-hour session, especially where most of them didn’t know what a podcast was when they stepped into the room.
Thus that challenge for them to go out and do something.
To help them a step further, we did a sort of sticky-storming activity – we got all of them to come up with podcast or vodcast ideas, write down each idea on a sticky note, and paste them on the wall. When everyone had their ideas stuck on the wall, they would look through the ideas and put a marking on those ideas they found interesting. The most interesting ideas would then have the most markings. (I’ll post photos of this activity as soon as I have access to them.)
When that activity was done, I asked the librarians if any of them would be interested in committing some time or effort in doing a podcast or vodcast. One lady raised her hand enthusiastically. Sensing their reticence, I asked the rest who were interested just to nod their heads as an indication, and many did – many more than I hoped for, which was really encouraging.
The compiled evaluation from the participants, which came in earlier today, was encouraging as well. Here are the compiled comments:
Liked Best:
Practical work – setting up podcast (6)
The relative informal way the course was conducted was refreshing. The topics were new to us therefore novel and interesting.
Various examples given.
The topic is interesting.
The video shown stimulated interest in subject.Needs improvement:
More on what types/categories of information available in podcast/vodcast.
Step by step written guide from software to recording and posting.
Examples of joint work, where not everyone was accessing same links.Other comments:
Well conducted course. Short and sweet.
And for those who like numbers, the average subject score was 4.5 out of 5, and the average trainer score was 4.6 out of 5. Librarians are so generous!
Anyway, now that some of the groundwork has been laid, and with some interest coming from the ground, I hope to see some interesting “new media” projects coming out of NLB in the near future.
Special thanks to those who’ve helped and contributed in one way or another, including Rajen and Ween from NLB Academy, Ivan from NLB, my colleague Maish, and Kevin, Walter, and Preetam.
Discover Blogs & Blogging
My colleague Maish is now teaching NLB librarians on blogging.
15:10: Talking about “live reporting”, using the 2004 tsunami example.
15:30 – 15:55: Break!
The highlight of the day:
15:55: Comment spam
16:05: Searching blogs
16:20: I did an impromptu presentation on RSS aggregators.
16:25: Business blogs
16:30: twitter
16:35: Hands-on blogging!
A Good Panel Moderator
I must admit that I didn’t gain very much intellectually from the recent Nexus 2007, because the level of discussions was generally mediocre.
Sure, there were some pretty smart panelists, but that alone isn’t always enough for a good panel discussion. Good moderation is thus crucial, which was mostly missing from the sessions I attended.
In a perfect world, there really isn’t a need for a panel moderator, just like there isn’t a need for a soccer referee. But because some panelists dominate discussions, others don’t contribute much, and discussions tend to go off-topic, the panel moderator plays an important role.
But while the role is an important one, the moderator should always remember that they are not the stars of the show, even though some of them may be stars in their own right. The moderator’s role is to bring out a good discussion from the panel, and stay out of the way when it’s happening. Just like you don’t want the soccer referee to be kicking the ball. Or worse, scoring a goal.
Sure, there are times when it makes sense for the moderator to give an introductory presentation to help the audience have a basic understanding of the topic at hand, but it would do well for the moderator to remember that it should be introductory, and as brief and succinct as possible. It’s tempting to add in fascinating bits of information to interest the audience, but this should be left for the panelists to do.
Once the introductions to the topic and the panelists are out of the way, the discussion proper commences. This is probably the toughest part of the moderator’s job, and this is where a good moderator makes the greatest difference.
Nothing is more unfair and disrespectful to the audience than for a discussion to go completely off topic. The audience has chosen to invest their time to listen to a discussion on that topic, so the moderator should keep checking and deciding if there’s a need to pull the conversation back on topic. But unlike in a soccer game where the referee blows the whistle every time the ball crosses the white line, the moderator has a large gray area to work with. And even if a panelist goes off topic, the moderator has to exercise judgment – is the off-topic anecdote interesting enough and short enough to be allowed through? or is the audience getting impatient, so that the moderator should step in?
Then there are panelists who talk too much, and those who contribute too little. The reason we have panels is so that we can hear different views on a topic. If a panelist dominates the discussion, or a panelist doesn’t contribute enough, the audience is shortchanged, and things aren’t moderate anymore.
If the moderator can keep the discussion on topic with all panelists contributing more or less equally, that would make the moderator a pretty good moderator, but not a great one. A great moderator introduces tension into the discussion – tension in the form of controversies, contradictions, and conflicts.
Controversies. Almost all topics have their controversies, and a good and easy way to create tension is for the moderator to ask the panelists on their view of the latest controversies. “Would if be a good idea for Singapore’s ruling political party to blog?” I might ask a panel discussing blogging in Singapore. The best controversies will bring out different views from different panelists.
Contradictions. It takes a sharp moderator to catch the contradictions made by the panelists. “You mentioned X just now, but now you seem to be saying Y. Could you clarify this?” or, “you once mentioned X in your blog, but now you’re saying Y…” The panelist who self-contradicts is not giving the audience enough respect, especially if that panelist hopes to get away it. The audience will appreciate the moderator who catches this, and soon the moderator will be seen as the star of the show. Wait, did I just contradict myself about being the star?
Conflicts. It’s hard to catch panelists contradicting themselves, but it’s much easier to catch them contradicting one another, giving the moderator a chance to create conflict. “Panelist A mentioned X just now. What is your view on X?” Good panelists (and dominant ones as well) will create conflict on their own, but quieter panelists would need a little more prodding. Again, conflict helps to add more views to the discussion, besides creating tension. Of course, the amount of conflict should be controlled, even though an escalation to physical conflict may make the panel a lot more memorable for the audience. So far, I’ve never encountered very serious (or exciting) conflicts during panel discussions. Unless you count the part when the audience gets to ask questions.
(Have you ever noticed that the Q&A segment is sometimes the most interesting and exciting part of the panel discussion? That’s almost always because some audience member raised a controversy, or pointed out some contradiction or otherwise had some conflict with the panel. Go figure.)
Then you have the audience member who rambles on and on before reaching the question, assuming that they even have a question. Nothing is more annoying than the audience member who needs to make a statement, or monopolizes the microphone. A good moderator must know how to firmly but politely remind the audience to get to the question quickly, and dismiss anything irrelevant. That audience member with issues may hate the moderator, but everyone else would be in love.
And when the time is up, the moderator must know how to give the session closure – usually by asking for some final words from the panel. Again, this should be kept short.
Nexus 2007. My favorite moment was during the Q&A of the final panel discussion, the Global Startup Panel. A young man from China went to the microphone to ask Cory Ondrejka a question. When Cory finally finished his reply, he asked the young man if he had anything else to ask, since he was still standing at the mic.
“I’m standing here out of respect for you,” he replied. Everyone cracked up.
Update:
Guy Kawasaki has a nice post on How To Be a Great Moderator, which gives a bunch of very practical tips.
User-Tested Designs
In design for users, user testing is often crucial, especially when the designer isn’t already very experienced in the area, or when comprehensive guidelines or heuristics aren’t available.
A couple of years ago, I followed some wheelchair-bound people around critique the accessibility of some new buildings that were designed with accessibility in mind.
The next picture is of the bathroom at a condominium clubhouse. The picture doesn’t show the handle bar on the right wall beside the toilet, but it’s there. Is this friendly for a wheelchair user?
The designer probably tried their best, and I thought their design was pretty decent. Then I saw the next one:
This bathroom is at a rehabilitative hospital, where many of the users are actually wheelchair users.
The obvious difference between this bathroom and the first one is that gray plastic seat folded up against the right wall, for a wheelchair user to sit on while having a shower. In the first bathroom, the wheelchair user would have to shower the wheelchair as well – not a good idea.
The first bathroom was designed with the help of (inadequate) guidelines, while the second one was user-tested. The difference would be glaring to a wheelchair user who wants to shower.
And once in a while, you encounter really bad designs.
Maybe the users have very long arms.
(Last picture via Chris Hielmann)
Update:
Here’s an interesting comment from Kim & Sophie that’s worth surfacing:
I’m a wheelchair user and that last photo reminds me of a bathroom in the airport in Halifax, Canada. It was great accessibility wise. That is until I tried to wash my hands. The soap dispenser was stuck to the mirror halfway between the counter top and ceiling! There was also another “accessible” (and I use that term VERY loosly) bathroom at the airport in Toronto, Canada where the toilet papoer roll was so low you had to practically lean ahead and hold your body up with yoru hand against the floor to rech it with your other hand!
Why the Matrix Will Not Happen
(This is a continuation from “the Future of Internet Is Virtual Worlds. Or Is It?”, and part 2).
A lot of people think that the Matrix is inevitable. I take a contrarian view.
But first – what do I mean by “the Matrix”? It’s just a scenario where our brains connect to the internet directly (not necessarily all the time), without the need for screens or keyboards, where we basically can live inside a shared virtual world, communicating, controlling, and sensing everything in our minds.
Is that inevitable?
Let’s first assume that the materialistic worldview is correct, meaning that human consciousness and thought is nothing more than neurons firing, and that there are no disembodied conscious entities like ghosts or spirits. If the sum total of humanity is no more than physics, then the Matrix is theoretically possible.
Let’s also assume that we’ll be able to find a way to interface the computer or internet to the changing and highly complex neural structure of our brains, without adverse effects.
And let’s just assume that technological advances will eventually make the Matrix possible – all you have to do, is recline and plug yourself in (assuming it’s not wireless). Other than a small minority of people diving into it, will the rest of us follow?
Maybe not.
If things become ideal, the Matrix will be incredibly compelling. Since computer data will have direct access to the brain, virtual environments with incredible sensations can be created and experienced, such that phycial roller coaster rides, reverse bungee jumping, and skydiving become sluggish in comparison. Imagine a heroin-induced high on steroids (assuming you’ve tried both heroin and steroids), only better. I’ll be the first to get addicted.
But that’s only if things become ideal. Of course, things will never be ideal.
Assuming that the internet remains decentralized, we can expect there to be rogue sites or virtual environments, created by naughty boys and girls. Imagine entering a rogue environment, designed specifically to harm visitors. The damage done will potentially be more than what a very bad drug trip can do, much worse than a serious case of paranoid schizophrenia. A horror nightmare on steroids?
Besides rogue sites, there will also be (black hat) hackers. Sure, if our brains are connected directly to the internet, there will be very serious security measures in place to prevent our minds from getting hacked. But because the payoffs of a successful hack is so high, where the hacker can potentially gain control over your mind, or let you hear their voice whenever they want, or rewrite your memories, or eventually possess you, there eventually will be a hacker smart and patient enough to break past your firewall.
That firewall is your final protection against the your loss of control over the only thing in the world that really matters – your mind.
Would you risk the ultimate loss so that you can enjoy the ultimate experience?
I don’t think so.
μεταcole 
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